This course considers some of the following key questions: What is the relationship between civic (or political) and religious identity? How does religious identity contribute to or detract from the common life of a polity? What values and goals must citizens share in order to ensure a flourishing society? In a liberal democracy, what values and goals must be shared in order to ensure the preservation of core principles such as liberty and self-government? Is there a need for a shared civic identity, and, if so, what is its content? Does religious identity have a place in the public square, or is it an impediment to robust civic unity? Are religious views legitimate in the public square only if they are (or can be) justified in purely secular terms? Does the translation of religious views into universal moral claims undermine the particularity of religion and the distinctiveness of religious identity? How does the relationship between civic and religious identity differ in non-Western and non-liberal societies? What can modern Islam contribute to the understanding of the relationship between civic and religious identity?

As beings rooted in a physical world governed by laws of
nature, we achieve sanctity through tangible and sensory means: acts of
charity, song, prayer, text study – and art. At the same
time, the Tanakh and Talmud express constant concern lest we give in to the
human temptation to render the Divine in finite form.This interdisciplinary course explores the
process through which art and
artists make use of physical means to achieve spiritual or intangible ends; and
the ways Judaism and Jewish sources deal with the tension between the physical
and the spiritual, between external act and internal meaning, between the
visual and the intellectual, the image and the idea.

This course will explore
classic works of Western moral philosophy and some key texts of Jewish moral
thought. The course is meant to enable students to understand some of the
enduring, fundamental problems of moral philosophy and some of the most
important approaches to formulating and addressing them. It is also—and
equally—intended to highlight some of the significant resources in Jewish
thought and the sorts of contributions they make to the main issues of moral
philosophy. Rather than being mainly a survey, aiming at surface acquaintance
with several thinkers, the course will be built around two centrally important
questions. The first is, “what is the nature and locus of moral value?” and the
second is “what is the nature of moral motivation; how and why would a person
be motivated to act on the basis of moral considerations?” Those questions
pervade the history of moral philosophy, and different thinkers’ approaches to
them shape key elements of their thought. Those thematic concerns will supply a
helpful architecture to our discussions.

Biblical Ideas and American DemocracyJay and Jeanie Schottenstein Honors Program at Yeshiva College Syllabus (PDF)The purpose of the seminar is to bring classic Jewish texts about government into conversation with the foundational works of American political thought. In so doing, we will consider the following questions: How did Jewish notions of politics, the social contract, and covenant impact the eventual structure and nature of the United States? How did the Bible figure in the debates about democracy and monarchy that took place during the time of America’s founding? What tensions exist between the notion of religious authority and the modern conception of personal autonomy? In what way is the United States different from European democracies, and what is the role of religion in American public life?

RIETS Courses

The purpose of the seminar is to consider the similarities and
differences between Jewish and Western approaches to the subjects of justice,
law, war and terrorism, and to ponder thereby how Jewish tradition would approach
the critical national security questions of our age. In so doing, we will discuss the following
questions: What is Judaism’s notion of
justice, national sovereignty and international law? What is the difference, for the halakha,
between tzedek and mishpat?
What can Jewish scholars learn from some of the most influential
classical and modern texts about war, politics and foreign affairs? What role should religious leaders in general,
and rabbanim in particular, play in
debates in America and Israel about national security?

The seminar will be overseen by Rabbi Soloveichik, and will feature
visiting scholars who have written on the subjects under discussion.
These visitors will include poskim, American and Israeli public intellectuals, national security and
foreign policy experts, and jurists.